Stepping out of history's shadow

Composer Karl Hartmann, who heroically resisted the Nazis, is remembered at the Proms tonight. It's about time, says Ivan Hewett

[Daily Telegraph, 11 August 2005]

For German composers the rise of Nazism was a severe test of moral and artistic fibre. Some of them managed to avoid it by fleeing to the safety of the UK or the USA. Of those who stayed, many were liquidated, above all if they were Jewish. Those who were allowed to live had to find a way to live with the regime. Many paid lip-service to it, while keeping their true feelings to themselves.